Obsidian & Blood

TWELVE

The Coyote's Son

When we came back, late in the following morning, the palace was still in shambles. The She-Snake's guards strode in the corridor, trying very hard to look in charge but only managing a particular kind of extreme bewilderment. They looked at Teomitl as though he might have the answers to their aimlessness; but Teomitl glared at them, and even without the ahuizotls, he looked daunting enough that no one wished to approach him with trivial matters.

I probed at the wards on my way in. They still seemed solid and reassuring, but there was something, some yield to them, like pushing against taut cotton. They might hold, but they could be torn.

Ceyaxochitl could have woven more, but she was dead, and Quenami had made it clear he couldn't or wouldn't help.

"Where to?" Teomitl asked.

I shook my head. "Manatzpa's rooms. I'll met you there. I have something else to check first."

What I did was brief: I merely checked with Palli that the search was progressing as foreseen – and that the She-Snake's promised guards had indeed arrived. There were more of them than I expected, though most of them were young, callow youths who still seemed to remember the feel of their childhood locks.

I guessed the She-Snake had a sense of humour.

"I've had better subordinates," Palli said with a sigh. "More respectful, too. But I guess I shouldn't complain."

"We'll take everything we can," I said, finally. "Everyone else seems to have other priorities at the moment." I hadn't seen my fellow high priests in a few days. I couldn't say I missed their company exactly, but imagining what else they might have done did go a long way towards making me nervous.

Palli spread his hands, in a gesture that seemed an eerie mirror of mine. "We'll make do, Acatl-tzin."

And I had to be content with that.

"On another subject," Palli said, "I've found something about the tar."

"The stains on the floor?" I asked, suddenly interested again. They seemed to fit into the larger puzzle, though I wasn't sure how.

"Yes," Palli said. "Tar isn't exactly common in the palace."

I couldn't even think of where the nearest tar pit might be, or what they would use it for. "And?"

Palli grimaced. "You know Echichilli-tzin?"

The dead councilman? What had he got to do with it? "Yes, but…"

"He was the one who asked for it, about fifteen days ago. And…" He grimaced again, a nervous tic. "He asked for a lot of it, Acatltzin."

A lot of things hadn't made sense lately, but this was firmly near the top of the list. "A lot?"

"Ten full jars," Palli said.

My mind balked at the mental picture. It did have cosmetic uses, but ten whole jars seemed excessive. "And what happened?"

"They came in. Echichilli-tzin sent his slaves to collect it. I've asked them. All they know is that it was brought here to the Revered Speaker's room."

"While he was still alive."

"Presumably with his consent."

"Hmm," I said. "Thank you. This is… intriguing." To say the least. "Let me know if you can find out more." Where had those jars gone, and what had they been used for? The only use that came to mind was seal the hull of a boat, and the thought of building a boat right in the Revered Speaker's rooms was absurd.

What was going in this palace? Whatever it was, it had started before the Revered Speaker's death, and it looked like we were the ones caught up in the consequences.

I fully intended to make sure the consequences weren't drastic.

I found Teomitl outside Manatzpa's rooms, in conversation with a stern, middle-aged woman who introduced herself as Manatzpa's wife. They'd had five children, the two eldest of whom were away, educated in the calmecac school. The three youngest were much too young to have noted much of importance; and Manatzpa's wife wasn't much more useful. She had barely known anything of her husband's affairs; the household policy had apparently consisted of "to each their own". She had not spoken of matters of domesticity; he had kept whatever business he had with the council and the Revered Speaker's election private.

The gods were decidedly not on our side.

We made a cursory examination of the rooms which didn't yield anything useful, and moved onto Manatzpa's private quarters.

In daylight they seemed much smaller than in my fevered imagination. They did wrap around two courtyards, but even the largest of them barely covered the surface of the Imperial Chambers. They had loomed much larger in my frantic flight of the night before.

As I had already noticed, the rooms were bare, with few ornaments. Manatzpa might have been a nobleman, but he had not believed in pomp any more than Teomitl. A few wicker chests and a few circular fans, carelessly tossed in corners where the feathers had creased, their colours all but faded; thin and simple reed mats, serving as little more than places to sit; and two unlit braziers.

I opened the wicker chests to find piles of vibrantly-coloured codices, ranging from lists of rituals to the tribute of the provinces. In the chest after that was poetry, carefully re-transcribed. Pride of place was given to a volume collecting the poetry of Nezahualcoyotl, the previous Revered Speaker of our neighbouring city Texcoco. The codex had been well-thumbed, but the glyphs were intact with no markings on the paper, the treasured possession of a man who seemed to have had few of them.

Altogether they painted the picture of a man whose interests had

been broad, a scholar, an intellectual whose curiosity extended to everything and anything. A man I might have appreciated, more than I ever had Quenami or Acamapichtli, had the circumstances been otherwise.

Teomitl was rummaging through another chest, shaking his head as he discarded clay vessels and worship thorns. At length he crossed his arms over his chest. "This is pointless, Acatl-tzin."

I couldn't help shaking my head in amusement. Teomitl might have had the raw power and the fighting spirit, but the minutiae of investigations would always be beyond him. "Have a little patience," I said, pulling aside a third chest to reveal treatises on medicine. "Whatever he left behind, he wouldn't have wanted us to find it. It's likely well hidden."

Teomitl frowned and moved to stand against one of the frescoes, his head at the level of Huitzilpochtli's angry face. "We're wasting our time while they move against us."

I lifted an almanac on plants and their uses, and moved to the rest of the pile. "The problem is that we don't know who 'they' are."

"Too many suspects?" Teomitl shook his head.

"Too many agendas," I said. It was a given that everybody was dabbling in magic or planning political moves against their opponents. The question was whose moves included star-demons. Manatzpa had sworn it wasn't him; and his death tended to prove it. But Xahuia was still on the loose; not to mention those who still remained within the palace compound.

And, the Duality curse me, I still had no idea of how it all intersected or made sense. A plot to bring the star-demons down shouldn't have had this many complications, this many people dying to prevent them from talking. Whatever else I might have said about She of the Silver Bells, She'd always been straightforward, much like Her brother. No tricks, just fire and blood and war.

"I see." Teomitl was silent for a while. "Acatl-tzin, I wish to apologise."

I turned, genuinely surprised. "What for?"

"For the other night."

It took me a while to see what he was referring to. Ages seemed to have passed since that night when he had walked away from me in the wake of our interview with Tizoc-tzin. "Don't mention it. We have bigger problems on our hands."

"It's the little cracks that break obsidian. The flaws that undo jade," Teomitl said. He looked me in the eye – proud, unashamed, his was as unlikely an apology as I had ever seen, and yet oddly touching. "You have your opinion about my brother, and I have mine."

"Yes," I said, cautiously. I wasn't quite sure of what opinion to have about Tizoc-tzin anymore, except that we were still at each other's throats.

"Let it remain that way." Teomitl made a small, dismissive gesture, a command that could not be denied. "Let's not talk further about this, or we'll disagree."

Probably, but I didn't say this. "As you wish."

I lifted another medicinal codex. I was almost at the bottom of the pile now, and still had nothing to show for my labour. The Southern Hummingbird blind us, it looked like Manatzpa had been prudent to excess.

Wait.

The second-to-last paper in the pile was much smaller, a single sheet of maguey fibre. The writing on it was the neat, elegant hand of someone used to glyphs, every colour applied with a sense of context and decorum that could only belong to a temple.

"Ueman, Fire Priest of Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, the Precious Twin:

"On this day Ten Flower in the year Two House, Councilman Manatzpa gave the temple ten rolls of the finest cotton cloths, fifty gold quills and one bag of quetzal tail-feathers, in exchange for the Breath of the Precious Twin."

The Breath of the Precious Twin was a costly protective spell that put the holder under the personal gaze of the god. Along with the Southern Hummingbird's protection, it was one of the most effective wards a man could barter for. I was wary of using it. Mictlan's magic was not compatible with Southern Hummingbird's spells, and while the Feathered Serpent might be one of the most benevolent deities, there was something inherently disturbing about having His eye permanently on me.

I hadn't seen it, but then he'd have taken precautions so it wasn't obvious. He had been a canny man – save, I guessed, when he'd started to resort to murder to have his way.

Mind you, the protective spell had not helped him much. The Obsidian Butterfly Itzpapalotl had sheared through it as though it barely existed and taken his soul with Her as easily as a man might take a basket of herbs.

The priest's name at the top of the paper was the same one Xahuia had given me. His title was given as Fire Priest, the secondin-command of the Wind Tower.

I turned the paper over thoughtfully. Ten Flower. Seven days ago. And the spell had not come cheap, either. Even for a man as rich as Manatzpa, the price was a fortune. Even before Echichilli's death Manatzpa had already been looking for protection, as if he had already known that something was going to happen. How had he known?

What in the Fifth World was this secret that star-demons killed for?

Behind us, the bells tinkled: one of the slaves, wearing the elegant collar of the palace servants around his neck. "Master, there is someone who wishes to see you."

"Us?" Teomitl stepped in.

The slave shook his head. "He asked for the High Priest for the Dead."

Someone I didn't know, then, not any of the players still remaining, who would have summoned me instead of coming here. But why me?

The youth who strode into the courtyard was a sight. It was not that he was richly dressed, with an elaborately embroidered cotton tunic, a plume of heron feathers at his belt and another set of feathers bending from the back of his head towards his neck. Rather, it was the state of the regalia – the feathers were torn, their white tarnished with blood, and dark splotches stained the tunic all around the collar line. He held his macuahitl sword a little too casually, as if daring an invisible watcher to attack him, and the shards shone a sickly grey-green in the sunlight.

Behind him were two Jaguar Knights in full regalia, the costume made of a jaguar's pelt and the helmet shaped like the jaguar's face, their heads protruding from between the jaws of the animal. They looked a little better, though their hands shook and their skin was the colour of muddy milk.

The youth looked at me. His eyes were an uncanny colour, a shade between grey and green. His gaze was piercing, not hostile, but stripping me of all pretences, like a spear breaking the skin and burying itself in my heart. "Acatl-tzin," he said thoughtfully. "High Priest for the Dead in Tenochtitlan. I have come to you for an accounting."

"An accounting?" Teomitl shifted, to stand between me and the youth. His hand had gone to the hilt of his macuahitl sword; and the planes of his face had started to harden.

The youth bowed, slightly ironically. "I am Nezahual, Revered Speaker of Texcoco. Where is my sister, Acatl-tzin?" His voice was harsh.

He couldn't be. I looked again, but he stood alone in the courtyard, with only two Jaguar Knights as an escort, casual and undisturbed, his dignity no less than it would have been had he sat in his own audience room. "Revered Speaker–"

"There is no point in dissembling. I know you were the one who ordered the arrest." Nezahual-tzin's face was harsh, unforgiving.

Teomitl shifted. "This is the High Priest for the Dead, one of the three who keep the balance of the Fifth World. You will show him respect."

Nezahual-tzin's gaze scoured him. A smile creased the corners of his broad lips. "A pup with a bite, I see." Sunlight fell over him in swathes, highlighting the blood on his clothes and on the obsidian studs of his macuahitl sword, and became a white, searing light strong enough to blind.

I remembered what Xahuia had said, that her brother was favoured by Quetzalcoatl, god of Creation and Wisdom. I had taken it as a grand boast, but quite obviously Nezahual-tzin had been brushed by the Feathered Serpent Himself. He might not have been an agent, the sole repository of the god's power, but he still had enough magic to make trouble if he wished to.

"Your god won't protect you." Teomitl's voice was scornful.

"Neither will your goddess, when it comes to this," Nezahualtzin said.

I'd never thought I'd see two young men fight like cockerels, an unseemly spectacle, witnesses or not. "Enough."

The light dimmed. Nezahual-tzin still stood as straight as a spear, waiting for my answer. "Your sister engaged in sorcery," I said, carefully.

"So does most of the Imperial Family."

"Not that kind of sorcery. The sorcerer in her service was named Nettoni."

Nezahual-tzin's eyes narrowed. "Mirror" could only refer to one god – Tezcatlipoca, the Smoking Mirror and eternal enemy of his own patron god Quetzalcoatl. "You lie."

"Ask around the palace," I said as casually as I could. I already had enough enemies without adding this cocksure boy to the list. "He was well-known."

Nezahual-tzin was silent for a while, pondering, giving me enough time to consider what would happen if he held me responsible. Enough unpleasant things to make me regret Tizoc-tzin's threats of dismissal.

Then he turned to the two Jaguar Knights who had escorted him inside. "Is this true?" he asked, bluntly.

The Jaguar Knights looked at each other. "Yes."

"I see." The light around him contracted as if someone had enclosed it in a fist. "Where is she, Acatl-tzin?"

It wasn't quite the same tone, though he still didn't look happy. Not that I could blame him, though I doubted it was affection that prompted his question. To lose her would be a fatal admission of weakness to the Texcocans.

I, on the other hand, didn't care much about losing face. "I don't know. Nettoni sacrificed himself to let her and her son escape. Presumably they found refuge somewhere in the city." And resumably she was still weaving her webs of intrigue. She was a determined woman.

"I see." He said nothing for a while. "Then my men and I will join the search for her. Let it not be said that a Texcocan can escape justice."

Teomitl stiffened in shock. "She's–"

"A political tool," I cut in.

Nezahual-tzin smiled, without much joy. "You still have much to learn, pup."

"Pup?"

"Teomitl," I said, warningly.

"He's the one picking the quarrel."

"No, he's the one provoking you. You don't have to answer."

I glared at Nezahual-tzin, daring him to counter with some mocking remark about how to keep my pup on a leash. But his face was serious again, and he was watching me with a gleam in his eyes I didn't care much for, like a snake making up its mind about a rodent. "Don't let me detain you," I said. "You must have plenty of rituals to attend, and respects to pay."

Nezahual-tzin smiled, that same thin, unamused smile I had seen on the face of the She-Snake. "No doubt." But he did not move, still considering me in that unnerving way of his.

"You owe respect to my brother," Teomitl cut in.

Nezahual-tzin's gaze moved, slightly. "The living one, or the dead one?"

"You know which one." Teomitl's face was flushed.

"The dead one." He turned to me, slightly bending his head, looking for all the world like a snake or a bird. "Apologies, Acatl-tzin. I knew him well in life, and I don't think he would begrudge me a little delay."

Of course, Axayacatl had been the one to save Nezahual-tzin, to cast down the over-ambitious brothers and bring the young Revered Speaker to Tenochtitlan. Which also meant he would know Tizoctzin and the She-Snake, and it did not look as though he was eager to see either. "The Dead can wait," I said, bowing my head in return. "But not on a caprice."

Nezahual-tzin shifted slightly, the obsidian shards of his macuahitl sword glinting in the sunlight. "Paying my respects is all I've come to do, after all. I'm Revered Speaker of Texcoco, and will not play a part in whatever squabbles Tizoc and the She-Snake have. But you don't look like a man likely to be caught in their games."

I wasn't sure whether to be embarrassed by his accuracy, or annoyed at the distant, unconcerned way he considered us all. Teomitl had no such scruples. "You look like a man too cowardly to be caught in anything, Nezahual-tzin."

Nezahual-tzin's lips curved around the word "pup", but he did not say it aloud, and luckily Teomitl didn't see it. "I've learnt to see where the priorities are " His gaze narrowed again, becoming infinitely distant, as if he held all the knowledge of the world. "For instance, you must have been wondering for a while where all the blood on us comes from."

Teomitl snorted. "What I've been wondering for a while is how you enticed the Jaguar Knights to follow you."

"Enticed? Hardly." Nezahual-tzin did not turn around. "But you're right, they're not my men."

I looked at the Knights again. My mistake, I should have known that Texcoco had no Jaguar House. Teomitl was obviously more knowledgeable about warrior orders than me, "Then…?" I asked. If he wanted to toy with us, fine. He was the Feathered Serpent's favoured indeed, enigmatic, taking advantage of the only thing he had, which was knowledge.

Nezahual-tzin made a gesture – satisfaction, annoyance? "Three star-demons. In the Jaguar House."

In daylight. Outside the palace wards. I scrabbled for words that seemed to have fled. "Did they kill anyone?"

I'd expected him to be triumphant at the shock he'd caused, to revel in our ignorance; but he looked serious again, like a commander on the eve of battle. "No. There are worse places where they could have appeared than a House of trained warriors."

It could have been worse. Much, much worse. The marketplace, the Houses of Joy…

I took a deep breath, hoping to close the hollow in my stomach. It didn't work. "So far, they've only appeared within the palace wards." It could mean the sorcerer was outside the wards, like, say, Xahuia, but then why had the Obsidian Butterfly, Itzpapalotl, been able to appear inside the palace and carry off Manatzpa's soul? No, the most likely explanation was that the Southern Hummingbird's protection was diminishing, and that the star-demons had grown stronger in the Fifth World.

Nezahual-tzin exhaled, in what was almost a hiss. "And one at a time?"

He was quick, the Revered Speaker of Texcoco, lithe and smooth like the snake that symbolised his protector. "Yes," I said.

It was getting worse. The boundaries between the worlds were slowly and irretrievably caving in. "I don't suppose you had a councilman or someone important inside the House at the time?"

"Besides myself?" Nezahual-tzin asked.

"They didn't attack you, did they?"

He shook his head, quick and annoyed. "Not any more than any of the other Knights. And the answer is no. Even the Jaguar Commander was absent."

No, not worse. Disastrous.

Teomitl was looking from Nezahual-tzin to me, back and forth, with growing determination on his features. "Then my brother has to be told. A new Revered Speaker must be chosen."

His naiveté was heartbreaking. "Teomitl, it's not that simple…" The problem wasn't only Tizoc-tzin. We would have to convince the She-Snake, as well as every single remaining member of the council. Tizoc-tzin wasn't popular enough to force the delayed vote.

"I don't see what's complicated. The Fifth World stands in jeopardy. Any personal interests must be set aside."

"If only." Nezahual-tzin's voice was sad, much older than his years.

Besides, even if a vote could be forced, it would take at least a day to set up, and further time to prepare the rituals of accession, time we no longer had. Star-demons on the loose, outside the palace, meant a greater threat than ever before. They had come not because they had been summoned, not because they had someone to kill, but of their own volition; for their own amusement.

Which meant the path to the Fifth World was wide enough to let them pass; and that we would see many more of them before the sun set.

"It's not a matter of days," I said. "Or even of hours. We have to do something, and we have to do it now."

"I imagine you know what?" Nezahual-tzin asked.

"Of course he knows," Teomitl snapped.

How I wished I did. Doing something. Doing… I racked my brains for an answer. My protector Lord Death had made it abundantly clear that He would not interfere in the affairs of humans. The Fifth Sun and the Southern Hummingbird had already demonstrated how weak they were. I held neither the favour of Tlaloc the Storm Lord, nor or his wife Chalchiuhtlicue, Jade Skirt, and I did not trust those two more than I had to. The Smoking Mirror, god of Fate and War, was to become the Sixth Sun, and could not be relied on, not to mention that he had tried to topple the Fifth Sun more times than I could count. Among the powerful gods, it left only the Feathered Serpent, to whom I did not have any particular ties. Perhaps Nezahual-tzin, who stood under the shadow of Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent…

On the other hand, I didn't see why I'd trust the boy just yet, with something that important. And yet…

I closed my eyes. The Duality was the source and arbiter of all the gods; our protector, the keeper of the souls that would be reborn under the Sixth Sun. Ceyaxochitl had been Their agent, and no new one would be invested for a while, not until the rituals for her succession could be completed; but it didn't mean They had withdrawn from us. Their wards around the palace, flimsy as they were, were probably our last possible defence.

But there had to be a way…

I was a priest for the Dead, and I did not know much of Duality lore.

But I knew someone who did.

"You cannot be serious." Yaotl's lips had thinned to a harsh line, the same colour as heart's blood.

"Do you see a better plan?" I asked.

We had left the boy-emperor of Texcoco to make his own way into the palace, no doubt clamouring for an absent Tizoc-tzin. He had looked at me thoughtfully as he left, a gaze that promised something I couldn't quite interpret: another meeting, or a challenge? He had more depths than I could probe currently, and since his protector god was not involved in the ongoing troubles, I was going to leave him well alone for now.

But I had little doubt we would meet again.

We had made our way into the Duality House, where we had found Yaotl having his noon meal. He had invited us to join him, though he surely had to be changing his mind, now that he knew what we were asking for.

Yaotl shook his head. "No. But it's not–"

"Ideal? I think we're well past that stage."

Yaotl sighed. "Fine. I already have all the priests I can spare warding the major temples of the Sacred Precinct. But it's not going to be enough."

"Then what would be?" I asked. "A new Guardian?"

"You don't become Guardian that easily." Yaotl's voice was grave, measured, carefully counting words, not focusing on their meaning. "The rituals of the investiture take time."

In other words, what I had known all along: it would be too late by the time the Duality could intervene. "There has to be a way we can get more than wards," I said. "Their equivalent of living blood." For any other god, it would have taken a human sacrifice: a removal of a heart, a drowning, a stabbing, the offering of a whole life and vessels brimming with blood. After all, the gods were dead, Their blood drained to feed the sun at the beginning of this age, Their own hearts long since torn out and burnt in honour of Tonatiuh the Fifth Sun. Only through living blood could They exercise Their power.

Yaotl grimaced. His eyes, wandering, fell on Teomitl; he stopped then, stared at the fresco behind Teomitl, which depicted the Fifth Sun rising from His pyre. "Wait here," he said, and was out of the room before either of us could stop him.

When he came back, he had two old priests in tow, a man and a woman who moved in precise, economical gestures. They wore the regalia of high-ranking clerics, a headdress of heron and duck feathers, and black cloaks with a blue hem depicting the fusedlovers symbol of the Duality. The priests looked at Teomitl speculatively for a moment, and then gave Yaotl a curt nod.

Teomitl, for whom patience was an alien word, wasn't about to be cowed, old priests or not. "Well?"

"There is a way," Yaotl said, slowly. "You're not going to like it."

That he said it in such a fashion, with no attempt whatsoever at sarcasm, was possibly the most worrying thing.

"Tell us," Teomitl snapped.

"You mentioned a new Guardian."

"To which you said it wouldn't help."

"They wouldn't have the Duality's powers, no," Yaotl said. "That takes time. The Duality doesn't choose Their agent on a whim. But, symbolically…" He pursed his lips. "Guardians are still the representative of the Duality in this world. The right choice, accompanied by the right rituals, could be the equivalent of a magical statement."

"The right choice," I said, slowly. "I don't understand what you're trying to say."

"Imperial Blood," Yaotl said. "To signify the tie between the Duality and the Fifth World. And a young woman, to remember that the Duality is the source of all life. The creator principle, male and female…"

"I don't understand," Teomitl said.

I did, and I didn't like where this was going. I remembered Ceyaxochitl's late-night confidences, that she had been married once, which had made her into the living symbol of the Duality. "You're jesting. Surely–"

"Of course I'm not jesting." Yaotl's lips curled up in a savage smile, and for a moment he was once more the insolent slave I'd known all my life.

"There is a chain of succession," I said. "Proper forms. You just can't choose a Guardian like this! You–" I stopped, then, for I'd been able to accuse him of being a mere slave. That would have been a mistake. Here in this room he was not my social inferior, but Ceyaxochitl's assistant, the man who held the order together.

The old priestess spoke up. "Ceyaxochitl-tzin had been watching the young woman for a while. She's impulsive, and untrained, and inexperienced, but all these can be remedied."

"Look," I said, feeling I was fighting against the lake's current in the rainy season. "Ceyaxochitl wasn't young. She made plans for her succession. There is a second-in-command, or someone like this, who's been waiting for years to claim the place. You can't…" You can't just go and give it to my sister, who's never asked for it in the first place.

"Our order will take decisions as it sees fit," the old priestess said, with the same authoritarian tone as Ceyaxochitl in her worst moods. "Our charge is the boundaries of the Fifth World, not politics."

And they were naive if they thought politics didn't apply.

"You don't even know if she's willing."

"Her wishes," the old priest said, firmly, "are the least of our concerns."

Clearly they didn't know Mihmatini at all, to say that. "There has to be someone else–"

"No." Yaotl's voice was firm. "It has to be a virgin of childbearing years, with magical knowledge, and associated with another virgin of Imperial blood. Can you think of anyone else, Acatl?"

I would have liked to, but no matter how much I racked my brains, I couldn't think of another name. For the sake of the Fifth World…

I made a last attempt to stem the tide. "You do know Teomitl is linked to another god."

The priest sniffed. "To two gods, as a matter of fact. But we're not asking him to be Guardian."

"You're still asking him to be a Guardian's husband," I said.

The priestess looked Teomitl up and down, clearly more for show than for anything else. Her mind seemed to have been made up before she entered the room. "We've discussed it. It's somewhat problematic, but the other benefits outweigh the risks."

The words weren't said, but I could hear them all the same; they would be naming a Guardian with a husband who would become Revered Speaker, master of the Empire's policy. Influence could flow both ways.

Gods, Mihmatini was going to flay us all. "What rituals did you have in mind?" I asked. "Another symbol? A wedding, a coupling?"

Yaotl grinned. "Close enough."

Exactly why I didn't want to go ahead with this. "Yaotl," I said, firmly. "There has to be someone else. I know Teomitl is convenient right now–"

"It's not a matter of convenience," Yaotl said. "It's a matter of need." His voice was low and fierce, and utterly serious. "If the stardemons are walking among us, then the end has already started. We have to buy time, and we have to buy it now. We're not going to go through all the imperial princes looking for virgins."

How could Yaotl even be sure Teomitl was a virgin?

But my student was sitting very straight, and he hadn't protested; I knew that, if he hadn't, it meant that it was true. "Acatl-tzin," Teomitl said. "We can at least ask her. Yaotl is right, there is too much at stake." He didn't sound wholly happy about that, and no wonder. Quite aside from my personal objections on the matter, Mihmatini was going to tear his head off.

"Look," I said. "It's all good theory, but…" But, the Storm Lord smite me, it was my sister we were talking about, not me or Teomitl. She was no priestess or imperial princess, just a normal girl readying herself for marriage and children. No one had pledged her to the defence of the Fifth World.

Yaotl, Teomitl and the priests were watching me, their faces as expressionless as those of carved statues.

"Acatl-tzin," Teomitl said. "I swear to the gods I'll marry her within the year. No matter what my brother thinks." His face was set in a fierce scowl, moments away from invoking Jade Skirt's presence. "It's the only right thing I could do, anyway."

"I don't want you to do the right thing," I said. "I want her to–" And then I stopped, realising I was making all the decisions for her, that I might have accused Tizoc-tzin, the She-Snake and the rest of the council of endangering the Fifth World through the selfishness of their acts, but, really, was what I was doing any better? It might not have been about power or influence, but I was still placing myself and my blood above the sake of the Fifth World.

"You win," I said with a sigh. "Let's go ask her. But you're doing the talking."

The fleeting grimace on Teomitl's face was a small but satisfactory victory, the only one I was likely to get all day.

We found Mihmatini still in Teomitl's rooms, staring at the frescoes as if she could peel the paint from the walls.

"I was starting to worry about you," she said, getting up. Her gaze descended to my scuffed sandals. "You look like you've been mauled."

"Close," I said.

"I had no idea Tizoc-tzin was so fierce," Mihmatini said, deadpan. She raised her eyes; Yaotl had just entered the courtyard. "And you would be…?"

Yaotl bowed, somewhat perfunctorily. "Who I am doesn't matter much at this juncture."

"I beg to differ," Mihmatini said, somewhat acidly. She puffed her cheeks, apparently considering something. "All right. What is it that you're not telling me?"

I'd never thought I'd actually see Teomitl embarrassed. If he could have turned crimson, he would have. But, as it was, he merely shifted slightly, as if he didn't quite know where to stand. "We, er–" He shook his head, and plunged on again. "We need your help."

She was silent for a while. "I see. What wonderful plan has Acatl come up with?"

Teomitl shook his head. "It wasn't his plan. Look, there are stardemons outside the palace…" He trailed off into silence; she let him flounder, without a word.

"How interesting," she said. "So many words to tell me nothing."

Teomitl blushed. I'd never seen such a sheepish expression on his face. "We need to keep them at bay, and, well…" He took a deep breath, started again. "They need to designate a new Guardian. Us. I mean, you, on account of the imperial connection and the virginity…"

Mihmatini raised an eyebrow. I winced, wishing I could look away. I knew that expression all too well.

Teomitl, too, apparently, for he hurriedly got a more coherent explanation of why we needed a new Guardian, and why it needed to be her. "It's symbolic. They need a couple who can stand for the Empire in the eyes of the Duality, and we don't have much time to find one. And, well, Ceyaxochitl had had an eye on you for a while, and thought you might be suitable for the job anyway…"

When Teomitl was finished, Mihmatini was silent again, deep in a dangerous kind of musing, just before she lashed out. She'd never shied from telling me or my brothers exactly what she thought of our heroic acts, and I had no doubt she would.

"I presume you're desperate," Mihmatini said, finally. "If you're coming to ask me."

I could imagine the smile on Yaotl's face without turning around.

"I'm not doing this for pleasure."

"Oh, for the Duality's sake, don't be so serious," Mihmatini said.

"It is a rather serious matter," Teomitl said.

"Most things are." She smiled again, half-amused, half-angry. "But you have no sense of humour, either of you. You should give some thought to working on that, Acatl. It's clearly missing from his education."

"Much as I love your wit–"

"I know, I know." She was sober again. "It's not exactly innocuous."

"Most of it was my idea," Yaotl admitted behind me. "If it helps."

Dear gods, we must really have been desperate, as she was saying. Since when had Yaotl owned up to having an opinion of his own? It was more sobering than I'd ever imagined it would be.

"No, it doesn't." Mihmatini's voice was low and dangerous now, as cutting as a jaguar's claws. "Let me make matters clear. I'm not a tool to be used at your convenience, just because there's a need for a well-connected virgin. I'm not a fool either, and I know what you're asking."

"Mihmatini–" Teomitl started.

We were asking her to step into a position equivalent to that of a High Priest, to take Ceyaxochitl's place, for the rest of her life.

"Look," I said. "I know you wanted to get married–"

"It doesn't seem to be incompatible," Mihmatini said, dryly. "But I'm not a fool. Whatever is needed is bad, if it's got both of you pushing for me to accept."

Teomitl tried speaking again, a little more forcefully. "I told Acatltzin I would–"

"I can guess what you told him. We both know it's not what you want that matters most," Mihmatini said, with a small sigh. "Otherwise it would have gone differently. Courtships don't last a year, Teomitl."

This time, he reddened. "I'll find a way."

"I don't see what would make it different."

"You think I'll renege on a promise?" Teomitl drew himself to his full height, Jade Skirt's magic hovering around him, lengthening his shadow on the ground.

"I think you'll do what you can," Mihmatini said. "I very much doubt it will be all you want, but it doesn't matter. Come on, Acatl, let's go."

She walked out of the courtyard without a backward glance for the spluttering Teomitl. Yaotl followed, leaving both of us alone under the Fifth Sun's gaze.

"She's angry," I said. "She doesn't mean what she says."

Teomitl's face was dark with something more than anger. "I think she means exactly what she says when she's angry, Acatl-tzin. That's always been the problem. But it doesn't matter. This is a promise I intend to keep." His hands had clenched into fists, so tightly his nails had drawn blood.

Not for the first time, I wished – desperately – that I could believe him.

The ritual for Mihmatini's designation was a fairly lengthy one; not quite as complicated as the investiture of a new Revered Speaker, but still heavy enough to need a night and a morning to be prepared.

We arrived at the Duality House early on the following morning. While the priests explained the ritual to Teomitl and Mihmatini, I excused myself; and went inside Ceyaxochitl's rooms to pay my respects.

My second-in-command Ichtaca sat cross-legged on the ground by the side of the funeral mat. His lips moved, silently intoning a litany for the Dead; he looked up at me when I came in, but left me time to contemplate the corpse.

Ceyaxochitl had been washed and garbed in many-coloured cotton. The jade bead had been threaded through her lips. In death she looked small and pathetic, her vibrancy extinguished. Yaotl had said he kept expecting her to rise and take charge. Looking at the thin, bloodless lips, at the pale, blue-tinged face, I knew she wouldn't come back. She was down there in the underworld, making her slow way to the throne of Lord Death, just as the rest of us would, someday.

It was unfair; she had been so much more than the rest of us.

"Acatl-tzin." Ichtaca bowed to me.

I nodded, briefly. "Thank you for undertaking the vigil."

His gaze suggested that I didn't need to thank him; that he was doing nothing more than his work.

"She will be missed," Ichtaca said. His round face was grave, and he wasn't talking about sentiments.

"I know," I said. She had held us together. No matter how abrasive, or authoritative, she had cared for all of us.

"You could…" He swallowed. "You could summon her."

I shook my head. "Not until her vigil is complete." I could go down into the underworld to hunt her soul, but it was starting to be dangerous. I could feel the world, lurching slightly out of kilter. To further breach the boundaries at this stage might not be a good idea. Not to mention a summoning would force Ceyaxochitl to turn aside, slowing down her progression in the underworld. I had no wish to make her stay there longer than it had to be.

I spoke a little more with Ichtaca, mostly over administrative matters; and left the room in a much worse mood than I'd entered it.

The shrine to the Duality was atop a pyramid, like the shrine in my own temple. From the smooth marble platform, I could see all the way into the courtyard, into the silent room, its entrance-curtain fluttering in the breeze, where Ceyaxochitl's body would be resting, washed and garbed for her funeral vigil. And, further on, into the city, the canals glittering in the afternoon sun like strings of jewels, the houses of noblemen gradually giving way to the high, steepled roofs of peasants' dwellings, all the heart and blood of our empire, as vulnerable as a jaguar with its throat bared.

Below, in the courtyard, most of the high-ranking priests had gathered, dressed in sober blue and black, a dizzying sea of featherheaddresses and ash-stained faces.

There were stars overhead, pinpoints of lights in the sky that were the eyes of monsters, shining in full daylight with no fear of the Fifth Sun. Yaotl was right, the end had already started.

I was High Priest for the Dead. I could do no less, no more than I was doing. But…

Behind me, on either side of the platform, stood Teomitl and Mihmatini. They were garbed like a couple for a wedding; Teomitl in a bright new cape, and my sister in a cotton blouse with a very simple embroidery pattern around the neckline, her hair hidden under a flowing head-cloth. Yaotl had spread cochineal red around her mouth, and given her a basket of fruit and tamales which she held with a slightly sceptical air.

I was suddenly, absurdly glad I wasn't the only one who couldn't feel the seriousness of the occasion.

The altar was bare, shining golden in the sun. The air seemed to shimmer with power, the priests of the Duality had been chanting for hours. The two elderly priests who had made the decision to name Mihmatini Guardian-designate stood on either side of the altar, their faces grave.

"Acatl-tzin." Teomitl held a jar of pulque alcohol with an utterly serious air. I was sure he was more used to attending dubious rituals.

"I know, I know." I was used to rituals; but it galled me to have to be a spectator on this one. At least I'd managed to bargain for the right to stay. It seemed a High Priest could attend on the pyramid platform, even if they took no part in the ceremony.

"Look," Mihmatini said, with an impatient shake of her head. "If you're going to ruin my life, you might as well not keep me waiting, Acatl."

"I…" I couldn't. There had to be some other god, some other ritual we could call on, some other solution that would keep the star-demons at bay, that would shelter us for a while more. There had to be…

I was grasping at maize seedlings, hoping they'd be strong enough to bear my weight. Pointless. We had already gone beyond the point when we could back out of this. Stifling a sigh, I moved to the edge of the platform, and watched the two priests officiate.

"Even as the maguey

You form a stalk, you are to ripen,

Taking root into the earth, you will hold up the sky

Your heart is jade, your heart is a precious green stone

Still virgin, pure, undefiled…"

Mihmatini shook her head; and in a fluid gesture removed the cloth over her hair. It spilled down her back in a flood to sit like the feathers of a raven. She approached the altar, her seashell bracelets tinkling with every step, not like the deep, ominous ringing of Coyolxauhqui's bells, but a light, airy sound like hundreds of footsteps following in her wake.

"Let us not go weeping forever

Let us not die in sorrow

Let the Fifth World be peopled, let the penance-born endure

Let us join together like the Lord and Lady of Duality…"

Teomitl set the pulque jar by the altar, whispering a prayer. Carefully he reached over to Mihmatini, and helped her into the altar. Then, still as tentatively as if every gesture would break a fragile balance, he reached out, and tied a knot between his cloak and her blouse. The sun outlined its contours, sloshed into the folds of the cloths; the knot seemed to sparkle as if studded with gold or jewels.

He paused for a while, staring at her, and it didn't seem a ritual anymore, just part of their relationship, something I had no right to intrude on. I averted my gaze, staring at the floor. Dots of lights were running along the marble, joining together to form larger stains, like blood pooling in the hollows of an altar.

"I lie down with you, I arise with you

You are the quivering in my heart

The shaking of the earth, the storm-tossed sky…"

I couldn't tell how long I stood there looking down, at stone that gradually became translucent, as if some inner light were springing to life underneath. The air was charged, heavy as before a storm, and yet it was as light and as pure as that of a winter day, smelling of cut grass and algae, and of scattered marigolds.

When I raised my eyes they were kissing, and the sun seemed to have descended into the Fifth World. The white light bathed them, outlining the shape of their clothes, their two faces, like images in some distorted mirror, the knot, into which radiance pooled like water from streams, two bodies, pressing more tightly against each other. The stains of light contracted and shuddered and, in one sweeping movement, converged on Mihmatini and Teomitl, washing away their features until all I could see were two darker silhouettes, like shadows on limestone.

Light arced from the altar into the heavens, spreading upwards, the opening of a huge flower, petal after iridescent petal shimmering into existence above us. The flower stretched, lost its shape, and the light died.

When my eyes had accustomed themselves again to the dimmer light I saw, against the Heavens, the glowing shape of a dome, and felt a faint pressure at the back of my mind, like a reminder of its weight. The stars shone in the sky, but they were only pinpoints of light, and the air still smelled fresh, like the marshes after the rain, like the first flowering of maize.

Teomitl and Mihmatini sat on the altar, pale and drained, their skin an unhealthy white. Mihmatini had closed her eyes; Teomitl sat as straight as usual, but his quivering muscles betrayed him. The two priests had taken a step back. Their faces were mostly dignified, but not without smugness.

I approached the altar, the marble warm under my sandals, the stone beating triumphantly, like a living heart.

Safe. We were safe for a few more days, if nothing more. The word beat in my chest, wove itself in my brain, over and over; a litany, a prayer.

"Can you stand?" the priestess asked.

Teomitl gently teased the knot open. Light spilled from the folds of the joined cloths, like a scattering of gemstones into a sunlit stream. He pulled himself up, one articulation at a time, with none of his usual speed. He winced as his feet touched the floor. "Mostly," he said. His face shifted from brown to the green of jade, and back to brown again. He couldn't quite control Jade Skirt's gift. He seemed to realise this, and shook his head in annoyance. "I've never had so much taken from me."

"It's because you've never asked for so much power." Mihmatini had not moved; she still sat on the altar, her hair unbound like that of a sacred courtesan, the red around her mouth smudged like the maw of a fed jaguar.

"Did it work?" she asked. Light still clung to her, a stubborn radiance that coated her skin and reflected itself into her eyes.

She frightened me more than I could put in words.

"Yes," the priest said. "Wonderfully."

"Thank the gods." Her voice was low, carefully pausing between words, as if unsure of the right one. Her hands shook. "If I'd gone through this for nothing, there would have been words, Acatl."

"I can imagine." The dome overhead pressed down on my mind, the words merging with each other in my thoughts. Safe, safe, safe.

I wondered why I couldn't feel any happiness over it.

"Come on," I said, ignoring the tightness in my chest. "Let's get you cleaned up."

By the time they'd dressed in everyday attire again, I'd seen that the light around Mihmatini did not diminish in intensity. It remained around her body, and a thinner thread linked her and Teomitl, like a reverse shadow on the ground, beating ponderously like a man breathing in his sleep.

A remnant of the Duality's touch, marking their new Guardian. As if we didn't have enough problems already.

They were waiting for us at the entrance to the Duality House, a group of warriors in Jaguar Knight livery; exquisite, from the jade rings on their fingers to their turquoise lip-plugs, their macuahitl swords casually hefted in their hands.

"Acatl-tzin," the burliest said. "Teomitl-tzin. Tizoc-tzin will see you now."

Their angry, resentful tone left little doubt as to what Tizoc-tzin would want to tell us.